


somebody call out to your brother

by Windybird



Category: A Plague Tale: Innocence (Video Game), Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Brother-Sister Relationships, Family Dynamics, Gen, Mommy Issues, Multi, Religious Conflict, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, Team as Family, Teen Angst
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-03
Updated: 2019-12-05
Packaged: 2021-02-26 03:28:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,029
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21656773
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Windybird/pseuds/Windybird
Summary: “They make conversation with the Maker and the Lady of Sorrow,” she continues, in a quiet voice, “who they can talk with about most anything, but their favorite topic is human beings. They watch over us, along with Mère and Père, and they make sure that we’re kept safe.”“They’re not very good at their jobs,” Hugo mumbles sleepily, reaching a hand up to touch the cut on Amicia’s cheek, red and stinging still hours after she’d come into direct contact with the sword of a particularly crazed chevalier. Amicia smiles.“They try,” She tells him. “They try the best they can, but it’s almost never enough. The rest must be up to us, Hugo. Up to you and me.”━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━Amicia de la Rune is prepared to spend a lifetime on the run from Inquisition forces with her little brother, Hugo. However, when the Inquisitor dies and leaves Hugo as the only person in all of Thedas with the Anchor, she'll have to shoulder the burden of Inquisitor alongside Hugo, and ensure their survival in the wake of a war intent on making martyrs of them all.
Relationships: Amicia de Rune & Hugo de Rune
Comments: 6
Kudos: 19





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> okay wow so I just finished a plague tale: innocence and wrote this immediately afterwards; I was genuinely so taken with the entire game- not just the voice acting (though I highly highly highly recommend playing w/ French audio bc they KILLED it), but the animation and the facial expressions and the storyline and the everything. 
> 
> however, it's important to note that you didn't have to play a plague tale to read this- but, like, if you haven't, please consider robbing the nearest bank to buy it on steam, and then come back and thank me later!

“Amicia? Are you asleep?”

“…I was. Hugo, why are you still awake?”

When she looks over her shoulder at him, he’s kneeling by the straw that serves as their mattresses, hands pressed tightly together against his chest. In the dark, the whites of his eyes glow, luminous and bright.

“I had a bad dream again. About Maman.”

Whatever Amicia’s feeling must show on her face, because Hugo’s eyes lower onto the dirt floor of the barn. Attempting to school her expression into something more neutral, she holds her arms out to Hugo.

“Come here, Hugo,” she says, and he dutifully falls into her arms, pressing himself against her so tightly, she can feel his little heart hammering away in his chest. She brings a hand over his head, stroking his fine, ash-brown hair in one continuous, gentle motion. “Remember what we said about Mère? And Père?”

“That they’re in a better place,” Hugo says, his voice muffled by her shirt. “But Amicia- in my dream, she was crying. Why would she cry if she didn’t feel any more pain? Or cold? Or hunger?”

His words echo around the loft, and Amicia tenses, peering at the gaps in between the boards to see if the lights in the farmhouse next to the barn are still extinguished. When she’s made sure they aren’t, she clutches Hugo tightly, too tightly, but though it must hurt, he doesn’t attempt to push himself away or move in the slightest.

“Like you said, Hugo,” Amicia whispers, “it was just a bad dream. Where she is, she isn’t crying. She’s happy, and safe, and warm, with Père. They sleep on mattresses made of clouds and pillows stuffed with goose feathers, and every night, they feast on the juiciest venison steaks you can think of, with the grease running down their fingers.”

She runs her own fingers lightly over Hugo’s, and he giggles, before sighing dreamily.

“Tell me more, Amicia.”

“They make conversation with the Maker and the Lady of Sorrow,” she continues, in a quiet voice, “who they can talk with about most anything, but their favorite topic is human beings. They watch over us, along with Mère and Père, and they make sure that we’re kept safe.”

“They’re not very good at their jobs,” Hugo mumbles sleepily, reaching a hand up to touch the cut on Amicia’s cheek, red and stinging still hours after she’d come into direct contact with the sword of a particularly crazed chevalier. Amicia smiles.

“They try,” She tells him. “They try the best they can, but it’s almost never enough. The rest must be up to us, Hugo. Up to you and me.”

“Mhm,” Hugo murmurs, hand dropping from her cheek and between their entwined bodies, where it curls into a small fist. Though he falls asleep quickly after that, a painfully long hour or two passes before Amicia finally finds herself drifting into unconsciousness-

And then Hugo’s shaking her awake, face screwed tight with panic when he finally comes into focus. Groggily, Amicia registers the weak moonlight filtering through the gaps in the wall- it’s maybe three or four in the morning, and she’s barely awake enough to register Hugo’s next words.

“They’re downstairs, Amicia!” He whispers, clutching at Amicia’s arm. Wide awake now, Amicia crawls towards the edge of the loft and peeks down, her braid falling past her left shoulder as she does so. There’s two Inquisition soldiers downstairs, poking violently at haystacks and chattering noisily to one another.

“Did you see the look on that fat whore’s face when we told her to hand over her jewelry?” One guffaws to the other, voice tinny through his metal helmet.

“’My husband gave that to me when I promised myself to him, you brutes!’” says the other, in a high falsetto that must be an imitation of the so-called fat whore. “You’d think we were pulling teeth. She sure changed her tune when she saw that sword of yours, though, didn’t she?”

“In more than one way,” the first guard responds, voice dripping with lasciviousness, and Amicia winces, pulling herself away from the edge of the loft as he comes further into view. “It’s a shame that dear, darling husband of hers wasn’t there when she needed him.”

“Amicia? What are they talking about? I don’t understand their language,” Hugo says, eyes wide as saucers.

“Nothing, Hugo,” Amicia says hurriedly. “Be a good little boy and stay there, alright? I’m going to distract the guards, and when I do, you need to be prepared to run.”

“No, don’t leave me-“ Hugo begins in protest, but Amicia’s already moving towards the ladder, carefully removing her slingshot from where it’s resting against the waistband of her trousers. Quietly taking a rock from the corner of the loft, she lines up her shot just outside the open barn door and releases.

“Did you hear that?” The soldier with the infamous sword asks in the King’s tongue, voice taut. “I’m going to check it out.”

“Don’t take any risks,” says the second soldier, watching his companion slowly edge towards the open barn doors.

“Damn,” Amicia mutters under her breath. Without taking her eyes off the second soldier, she scrounges around for a second rock. Her hand makes contact with something hard and bumpy, and when she looks down, she realizes Hugo’s pressing a small rock into her hand.

“Thank you,” she whispers, wasting a precious second to run her hand down the back of his head. “Now stay back.”

He nods earnestly, moving away, and she makes quick work of the guard, the rock smashing into the soft spot in the center of his skull easily. She can’t admire her handiwork for too long, though, because as luck would have it, his companion comes back in a few seconds, grasping his sword.

“Cyric!” is the first word that comes out of his mouth, and then “You!” and then he’s climbing up the ladder, much too quickly for Amicia’s liking. Shaking with adrenaline, she rushes over and kicks the ladder to the ground before he can reach the loft.

As he struggles to push the ladder off of him and his heavy armor, cursing the ‘little bitch’ that’s dared attack soldiers of the Inquisition, Amicia reaches for Hugo’s hand.

“Jump!” She cries, and before she’s able to think about it, she’s jumping the ten-foot distance between the loft and the ground floor of the barn. Distantly, she registers a blooming pain flaring in her ankle, but she ignores it as she tightens her grip on Hugo’s hand and sprints away from the barn, heading straight for the fields of tall grass surrounding the farm.

They manage to sneak past several Inquisition agents on the way out of the farmland, but as the area becomes more deserted, she realizes with growing concern that the pain in her ankle has grown worse. When she asks Hugo if he’s hurt, he responds with a quick shake of his head.

“My pinkie toe hurt at first,” he tells her solemnly, “but then I healed it. Are you alright, Amicia? Shall I heal you, too?”

But she’s shaking her head even before the words come out of his mouth. He already looks haggard and drawn, and she knows it’s as much because of his magic usage as it is their month on the run.

“Save your energy,” she tells him, even as another shock of pain lances up her ankle. “I’ll be fine, Hugo. I just need to rest.”

The sun is shining merrily when they finally reach a nearby village, one that Amicia is delighted to find completely deserted (“This,” she tells Hugo, “means that the Inquisition has already passed here.”) Though the houses still have pillars of smoke coming from them, she finds one that isn’t in a state of complete disaster and quickly ushers Hugo inside, firmly closing the door behind them.

The Maker must be smiling on them, because they manage to find a basket of apples (three of which aren’t rotten, which Hugo notes with infectious enthusiasm), a stale loaf of bread, and a jug of water that Amicia deems safe to drink, if a little musty. They make camp in the cellar of the house, dining on their little feast, and though several weeks ago, Amicia would turn up her nose if offered the same meal- the daughter of a chevalier from Val Royeaux is, of course, accustomed to much better fare-, she devours her share of the food with a ravenousness that scares herself. It’s been maybe two days since she and Hugo last ate, and though it pains her to do so, she pushes the last apple towards Hugo.

“Really?” Hugo asks, his expression so sweetly bewildered that Amicia can’t help pulling an arm across his shoulders and bringing him in close. “I can really have it, Amicia?”

“Of course you can,” she says, melting completely. “Because if you don’t gobble that apple up, then I’m going to have to gobble _you_ up, little boy!”

She jabs her fingers into his ribs, and he squeals, squirming away with laughter bubbling from his throat. She laughs too, feeling more light and carefree than she has in a while, until her ankle throbs once more and she realizes it’s not going to get better before it gets worse.

“Wait down here, alright?” She tells Hugo. “I’m going to try and find some bandages and disinfectant for my ankle. Don’t move.”

“Don’t go too far,” Hugo tells her, and she can’t help but smile.

“It’s a deal.”

She creeps upstairs, biting back a groan with every step, but it’s only when she reaches what must’ve been the master bedroom and rests her ankle on the smoldering ruins of a canopy bed that she realizes how grievous her injury is. The skin around her ankle is swollen and inflamed, tender to the touch when she gently probes it. Hissing through her teeth, she looks around in the cupboards, trying to find some sort of fabric she could use to wrap around her ankle, but the best she can make do with is a scrap of the blanket that once belonged to the bed.

As she winds it around her ankle, she hears a noise from outside. It could be very well just a squirrel stepping on a branch, or something equally as innocuous and fairy tale-esque, but the sinking feeling in her chest seems to tell her otherwise. When she peers through the broken window of the bedroom, she sees, to her horror, a troop of soldiers marching to the house. Standing at the front of them is a porcelain-pale young man with a pointy hat and a serious countenance, and a woman with broad shoulders and short, spiky black hair. The man says something to the woman, and though Amicia can’t tell exactly what he’s saying, she can guess well enough when the woman directs the soldiers to surround the house.

Breath coming in quick, sharp pants, Amicia limps across the room just as the door downstairs opens with a bang. Cursing softly, she shoves herself in the small space between the bureau and the wall as the heavy footfalls of soldiers echo up the staircase. She watches as metal grieves come into view in the space beneath the bureau, the rest of the soldiers marching down the corridor and into each room in the hall- one soldier for each room, Amicia guesses quickly.

She’s lucky that this soldier hasn’t deemed fit to wear his helmet. Readying her slingshot, she grabs a small chunk of ruined brick off the ground and lobs it at the back of the man’s head. Fortunately, he goes down quickly. Unfortunately, the sound of his armor crashing against the floor sends three more soldiers running into the room.

They spot Amicia immediately, and before she can attempt to run past them, one wrenches her arm behind her back roughly. She cries out in pain, but the soldiers ignore her as they usher her down the staircase and send her sprawling into the parlor room.

“Enough!” cries the woman with short black hair. Up close, she’s even more intimidating; Amicia can see the wiry muscles underneath the woman’s armor, and there’s a long, jagged line running down the side of her jaw that hints at a story from long ago. The man standing beside her is perhaps even more frightening, despite the fact that he’s not even a fraction as muscle-bound as she is; his eyes, underneath his pointy hat and light blonde hair, are piercing when they meet Amicia’s.

“Where is the boy?” The woman demands. In response, Amicia clenches her jaw and tilts her chin defiantly.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she bites out. The soldier holding her arm tightens her grip, and she forgets her resolve to be stoic as she yelped in pain.

“Stop that!” The woman snaps, eyes blazing, and Amicia’s not sure whether she’s talking to her or the soldier. Both, she supposes, as the soldier reluctantly loosens his hold, and the woman steps closer.

“I know he’s with you,” the woman continues. “An Orlesian boy and his older sister have been spotted in this area. The girl killed one of my men, a soldier of the Inquisition. You would know something about that, wouldn’t you?”

“I’m not Orlesian,” Amicia snaps, and it’s partially true- she can never go back to Orlais now, overrun as it is by Inquisition knights. The Domain has been infested by the lot of them- like rats, only far more irksome and dangerous.

“You have an accent.”

“So do you,” Amicia points out, and the woman pulls her teeth back into a grimace.

“This is pointless. I’ll ask you again- _where is the boy_?”

“He’s downstairs,” says the man beside her suddenly, and Amicia tenses as his eyes scan her face. “In the cellar. When she looks at him, she sees her mother, her father- and there’s love there, yes, but also pain and regret, and the constant fear that she might lose him as well-“

“Cole,” Cassandra interrupts. “You’re doing it again.”

“Sorry, Cassandra,” says Cole, and a hysterical laugh bubbles in Amicia’s throat. He looks as chastised as Hugo did when he nearly gave their position away to Inquisition agents yesterday morning because of his excitement over the frogs in the pond near the farm.

“Men, move out,” Cassandra directs, and all humor dies in Amicia’s chest when she watches the soldiers file down the cellar staircase. Though she attempts to writhe out of the soldier’s grip, it’s as pointless as trying to move her feet from quicksand, and she’s sinking fast as the soldiers reemerge, with a screaming, crying Hugo in tow.

“Hugo! _Hugo, no_!” Amicia screams, sounding more young and panicked than she’s heard herself sound in years. With a strength she didn’t know she had until now, she stomps on the soldier’s foot. More out of surprise than anything else, he lets go of her, and she tackles the soldier holding Hugo onto the floor, thrusting open the ventail of his helmet and slamming her fist into his stunned face.

“Run!” She screams at Hugo, and the last thing she sees is him running out the open door with a pack of soldiers right on his heels, before something hard rams into the back of her head and everything goes dark and silent.

* * *

When she wakes up, her head and ankle are throbbing in unison. She groans, reaching up to touch the stabbing pain at the back of her skull- and then stops short, the chains attached to her wrist rattling as she stares at them uncomprehendingly.

“We put those on for your own safety,” says a voice from the corner of the room, “and for our own.” When she looks up, Cassandra is standing in front of her, a grim expression on her face as she meets her eyes. Flanking her on either side is a woman with auburn hair peeking out from her purple hood, a blonde man with furs hanging from his shoulders, and a delicate-featured woman, the gold of her shirt gleaming in the dim candlelight of the room.

“Where is my brother?” Amicia demands, pulling instinctively at the chains. “What have you done with him?”

“He’s safe,” says the woman with auburn hair. “For now. And if you answer all of our questions, he will continue to be so for a while longer.”

“ _Monstres_! _Bâtards!”_ Amicia snaps, too upset to speak in the King’s tongue, though she’s sure the gist has come across, if the dark look that passes over the woman’s face is any inclination. “He’s just a little boy! If you hurt him-“

“That,” says the blonde man, shooting a warning look at the auburn-haired woman, “is not our intention in the slightest. We just want to ask you a few questions, that’s all.”

“Like your Inquisition agent asked that farmer’s wife a ‘question?’” Amicia asks in disgust, and the woman wearing the golden shirt frowns.

“Whatever could you possibly mean, my la-“

“That’s not important right now,” Cassandra interrupts impatiently, hands on her hips. “What’s important is that you answer all our questions honestly, and to the best of your ability. Do you understand, girl?”

“Don’t call me girl.”

“Were you or were you not at the Divine Conclave?” Cassandra continues, ignoring her. Amicia frowns, eyeing her warily. She was, for that matter- her mother, being one of Fiona’s closest friends, and her father, former Knight-Commander of one of the most prestigious circles in Orlais, were invited along with their children, but they had barely managed to escape the explosion with their lives, a sheer barrier Beatrice de la Rune constructed being the only thing stopping them from being crushed to death by falling debris and burned alive by the firestorms.

When she reluctantly says as much to Cassandra, the latter shares a significant look with the others.

“Why didn’t you come forward as survivors, along with the- the former Inquisitor?” The man inquires, faltering only a little at the allusion to Lord Trevelyan, though by the grimace on his face, it’s clear he didn’t mean to hesitate even that much.

“By the time you found your _Lord Herald_ ,” Amicia says, sneering at the title, “My family and I were back home, nursing our wounds and believing we had survived a devastating but pointless massacre. When your Inquisition was finally reinstated, Mère thought it best that we pretend to have nothing to do with it.

"We didn’t know anything of value, she said; we weren’t policy drafters nor key players, and so what would be the purpose of thrusting our family into the public eye? We’d dealt with enough, being the children of a Knight-Commander who left his post out of love for one of the mages inside his circle. And besides, Hugo wouldn’t be well enough for another trip into the Frostback Mountains. He was already traumatized as was from the attack.”

She vividly remembers the nightmares that followed for weeks afterwards; though his room was the furthest from hers, all the way at the end of the hall, she was still woken up by the sound of his screams every night. Her mother had to draft a special draught with ingredients sent from all the way in Nevarra to get him to calm down at last.

“Still, you should’ve come forward,” says the auburn-haired woman, shaking her head. “Especially when you began to notice the green mark on Hugo’s hand.”

Amicia stares at her like she’s grown a second head. “There’s no green mark on Hugo’s hand.”

The auburn-haired woman blinks, before regaining her composure. “Of course there is. That’s why we came to find you, after all.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Amicia says, trying hard not to lose her cool- though it’s hard, particularly when the shackles attached to her wrist grind against the fine bones there as she fidgets uncomfortably from her place on the ground. “Hugo is sickly; he’s been having head pains and nightmares since I can remember. They increased after the Conclave, but Mère’s droughts always managed to soothe him. When she- when she told me to watch over Hugo, she gave me a bag of droughts to give to him whenever his head started acting up.”

“And do you still have these droughts?” asks the blonde man.

“No,” Amicia says, frowning at him. “Your men took my bag and my slingshot away when I woke up in this room.”

“Have the men check where they’ve put the girl’s bag, Josephine,” The blonde man murmurs to the delicate-featured woman, who nods her acquiescence.

Turning back to Amicia, the man clears his throat purposefully. “The reason we brought you and your brother here is because we have reason to believe he is the second and only person in all of Thedas to be branded with the Anchor- the first being, of course, the late Lord Trevelyan.”

Amicia has prided herself on being a fluent speaker in both Orlesian and the King’s tongue since she was only a little older than Hugo; however, there is reason to believe she’s missed out on certain dialects or phrases of the latter, because what she’s hearing right now cannot possibly be spoken with such a matter-of-fact tone of voice.

“Hugo doesn’t have the Anchor,” Amicia says slowly, enunciating her words as if speaking to insane people. Which there’s a good chance these people are- the actions of the Inquisition in the past month or so haven’t exactly been the actions of people with sound hearts and minds. “He’s just a little boy- he wouldn’t hurt a fly, for the Maker’s sake! Whoever told you that he has the Mark is lying to you, and if you believe them, then you deserve to be fooled.”

When they don’t say anything to this, Amicia adds, I’ve answered your questions. Take me to my brother. _Now_.”

The spirit of a dead poet with a keen sense for dramatic irony must be hanging in the space between Thedas and the Fade, because the next thing she knows, the door is being flung open, and in comes Hugo in a whirl of messy hair and flailing limbs that attach themselves to Amicia’s middle. Though her arms are restrained, she presses herself against Hugo as best as she can.

“Amicia! Amicia!” He cries, and perhaps it’s the presence of so many adults in the room, but he’s never seemed as small as he does now. “I didn’t know where you were! I thought you were dead!”

“How could I leave you, silly goose?” Amicia asks, tears stinging her eyes as she presses her cheek against the top of his head, breathing in deeply as to avoid sobbing in front of people that she would’ve rather cut her own tongue out in front of than to give them the satisfaction of being able to see her cry.

“I didn’t understand a word they were saying,” Hugo continues, “but I kept on saying your name, and eventually they brought me from the infirmary to here. Why are you all chained up? Are you hurt?”

“That’s supposed to be my line,” Amicia says, laughing shakily before she looks up. Hugo’s brought with him more unwelcome guests- a thin, bald elf with an egg-shaped head, and a golden-haired dwarf with a crossbow strapped to his shoulder.

Before they can say anything, Hugo turns to them and, with an undeniably imperious air, demands, “Let my sister go! Now!”

“Uh… what’s the kid saying?” asks the dwarf, raising his eyebrows at Amicia. Josephine jumps in, much to Amicia’s surprise.

“’Let my sister go,’” she translates, albeit with much less righteous anger in her tone. “I suppose we can’t fault the Chosen One his request, can we?”

“Don’t call him that,” Amicia growls as Cassandra fishes out the keys to the chains from her pockets, reaching over to release her as gingerly as someone might dip their hand in a tank of piranhas. The second she’s released from her bondage, she sinks onto her knees and wraps her arms around Hugo, hugging him so tightly she’s afraid she might’ve cracked a rib once she leans back, hands resting on his narrow shoulders.

“They didn’t hurt you, did they?” Amicia asks worriedly, looking him over for any injuries. Aside from a shallow cut on his forehead, he doesn’t look worse for wear, but Amicia still wants verbal confirmation that he’s alright, that their separation wasn’t as traumatizing for him as it was for her.

“No, Amicia,” Hugo says. “They gave me water and lots and lots of food- bread and butter, smoked fish, bone broth, and even apple pie for dessert!”

“Like fattening up cattle for the slaughter,” Amicia mutters darkly, but just shakes her head when Hugo tilts his at her curiously. Still, a proper meal does sound good right about now, she thinks. Her stomach agrees loudly.

“We’ll get you something to eat and have you rest a bit before we continue our… negotiations,” Josephine tells her, choosing her words carefully, and though Amicia rolls her eyes, she can’t help but the pit of nerves in the bottom of her stomach loosen as she follows her and the others out of the questioning room, Hugo holding her hand like a lifeline all the while.


	2. Chapter 2

The main hall is as grand as imposing as Amicia’s expected it to be. Gothic chandeliers hang from the high stone ceiling, while long cedar tables line the walkway on either side of the lavish carpet leading up to the throne of the Inquisitor. Amicia stares at this- picturing the Inquisitor passing judgment with a dismissive wave of his hand, sitting atop plush cushions as the rest of the world starves and burns and falls into chaos- fury flaring up in her chest as she forces herself to turn away.

She doesn’t realize how hungry she is until she spots the mountain of food on the cedar tables, the comforting aroma of seasoned potatoes and thick meat stew wafting in the drift of the wind whistling through the hall. The only thing that stops her from gorging herself on the platters of venison steak is the very real possibility that it might all be poisoned.

When she says so, the auburn-haired woman, Leliana (she and the man, Cullen, made stilted introductions during the walk over to the main hall), snorts derisively.

“If we wanted to kill you, we would do it far more discreetly than this, I promise you,” she says, and though it’s a small comfort to be reminded that there are far more efficient ways in which she could potentially kill them, Amicia sits down at the table anyway, hesitantly picking up a drumstick before ladling more food onto her plate, and Hugo’s, though he claims he’s already full from the apple pie.

“Do you know of the circumstances surrounding the death of the former Inquisitor, Lady de Rune?” Josephine asks, amber eyes bright and intent in the dim candlelight. Amicia sinks her teeth into the tender meat of her drumstick as she considers the question.

“I know that Duchess Florianne murdered him during the Winter Ball, and that she was murdered in retaliation by Monsieur Cann- Monsieur Cullen,” she says, barely avoiding saying ‘Monsieur Cannonball’ as she gestures towards the man in question with the leg bone of the chicken she’s just decimated. Though she has no love for the Inquisition, she’s well aware that impudence now might mean a world of pain for her and Hugo later. “But aside from that, not much else.”

“When Duchess Florianne ran that sword through his chest,” Leliana says, eyes blazing, “she must’ve thought that this would mean the definitive end of the Inquisition, and the beginning of Corypheus’s reign. This was not so. Despite there being considerable rocky effects to the Inquisition’s foundation, we managed to keep our influence- if only by a hair’s width. But besides politics, besides the effect it had on the Empress of Orlais’s relationship with us, it meant that we had lost the one person that could close the rifts, and keep demons from wreaking havoc on innocents. Or so we thought.”

“That’s where Cole here came in,” Varric interjects, clapping the boy’s shoulder with a paternal air.

Cole nods seriously, eyes trained on Amicia in a way that makes her fidget uncomfortably.

“I sensed you,” He says, eyes flickering over to where Hugo is making a mess of his roasted duck. She can’t help but feel envious of him, a little bit; she would give everything to be none the wiser about their choice of discussion right now. “I could feel the blood inside you, coursing through you, like a tugging underneath my skin.”

“You were the last link to the Prima Macula,” Solas explains, when it becomes clear that Amicia has no idea how to respond to that. “The elven orb whose power your brother and the Inquisitor alike soaked up. It didn’t take too long to find you; there had been rumors of a young girl and her little brother in the area, plucking off Inquisition soldiers and stealing farmer’s crops.”

Amicia colors, but she refuses to look away from him. “We were starving, and the Inquisition came after _us_ first. We don’t have anything to apologize for.”

Solas puts his hands up in surrender, much to her bemusement. “Fair enough. But the matter at hand still remains, and we need to resolve it as soon as possible. The Inquisition is not going to last much longer without a leader, and who better to lead it than the one who has the power to seal the rifts?”

It takes a few seconds for the words to register fully, but when they do, Amicia draws a protective arm over Hugo and brings him close, as though she could stop them from taking him away from her by sheer willpower.

“Over my dead body!” She growls, and Hugo looks up at her, alarmed.

“Amicia? What is it? What’s wrong?” He asks, tugging at her shirt with sauce-stained hands.

Ignoring him, Amicia continues. “Your Inquisition murdered our parents, they razed our lands; they took _everything_ from us. And to ask me if I’d consent to having Hugo be the little tyrant at the forefront of your Inquisition-“

“Not just him, of course,” Varric interrupts smoothly, casually chewing on a drumstick as he speaks. “I doubt the other nations would take us seriously if we put in charge a leader barely out of diapers. His sister, however- capable, protective, loyal to a fault-, would be perfect for our services.”

“The soldiers who took your land were rogues and traitors,” Cullen proclaims, looking at Amicia with a pleading look on his face that probably made all the girls’ hearts a-flutter back home. “We denounced those factions long ago, Amicia.”

“So do something about them!” Amicia cries, rising to her feet. “Instead of making excuses, weed them out! Don’t let another family be destroyed by them!”

“If we had the manpower to do so,” Cassandra says through gritted teeth, “we would have already done it long ago. But the former Inquisitor’s passing has weakened resolve considerably, and our army is diminishing in number by the hour. If you and Hugo were to take the mantle of Inquisitor-“

“That’s a big if,” Amicia says, still glowering as she slowly sits back down.

“-then perhaps we would be able to, as you say, weed them out,” finishes Cassandra, just as irate. Amicia sits back in her chair, mind racing as she stares at the grooves in the table. Hugo has already been exposed to so much more than she’d ever want for him, and to force him to even partially partake in the consequences of being the Inquisitor is something she knows for a fact that Mère and Père would never consider, even for a moment.

But they’re dead, and if she isn’t careful with her decision, they’ll follow in their parents’ footsteps not long after. Either the rift will grow in size until the entirety of Thedas is overrun with demons, or she and Hugo will be eventually murdered by the Inquisition after their usefulness is deemed obsolete.

“I need to speak with my brother about this,” She decides at last. The advisors exchange a look.

“Are you sure about that, Amicia?” Varric asks hesitantly. “I mean, he’s five. It’s not like he’ll have any insightful battle tactics to share with you-“

“I need to speak with my brother about this,” she repeats, folding her arms across her chest resolutely, and though the adults don’t look too happy about this, they slowly file out of the main hall. Once they’ve gone, the hall seems far larger- bigger, perhaps, than the entire ground floor of their estate, though she knows that the Domain was just as grand.

“Where are they going?” Hugo asks, making a move to follow them, but Amicia holds his wrist, keeping him in place beside her.

“The Inquisition has made us an offer of- of sorts,” she says, haltingly. Hugo tilts his head at her, owlishly inquisitive.

“What kind of offer?”

“Do you remember the glowy thing on the Inquisitor’s hand, Hugo? The one that allowed him to seal the rifts?” She asks. He nods slowly, scrutinizing her face as though trying to gauge whether or not it’s a trick question.

“Yes.”

“You have the same power,” she tells him, throat tight. “Mère’s draughts suppressed it, but it’s been inside of you this entire time. We can either use it to help the Inquisition seal the rifts, or-“

“Or?”

“Or we can run away,” she says, forcing herself not to look away. “We can take whatever food and blankets the Inquisition have, and we can go somewhere far away, perhaps as far as Seheron. But we need it to be a fair decision. If you want to go, all you have to do is tell me, and-“

“No,” Hugo says.

Blinking, Amicia takes his hand and gives it a gentle squeeze. “Are you sure? You can say no, Hugo. Whatever you decide-“

“I want to stay,” Hugo says, setting his jaw in such a clear emulation of Père that she has to struggle to retain her composure. “I’m tired of running, Amicia. And always being hungry and cold. And not knowing where we’re going to sleep at night. Oh, can’t we stay, please?”

“It comes with a price,” Amicia says warningly, knowing she’s not being fair, and not particularly feeling like restraining herself, regardless. “We’ll have to be the Inquisitors, you and I.”

If she thought that would dissuade him, however, she’s dismayed to realize that this registers as an immense benefit, in Hugo’s eyes.

“Like kings and queens in a castle!” He exclaims, throwing his arms out wide, as if to embrace the entirety of Skyhold all at once. And despite her- for lack of a stronger term- reservations, she can’t help but feel emboldened by this endearingly naïve statement, spoken by a Hugo that hasn’t allowed the past month to eat away at his youthful exuberance at life. “We’ll be heroes, won’t we, Amicia?”

“Yes,” she whispers, blinking back tears as she presses a kiss to the crown of his head. “We’ll be heroes.”

Still, though, she’d rather be battling a dragon than see the look of smug satisfaction on Leliana’s face when she tells her of their decision. Her dread is only justified further when the self-congratulatory smiles spread not only on Leliana's face, but splitting across the faces of every single adult in the small study adjoined to the main hall, when she finally comes to deliver their verdict. They'd been arguing in hushed whispers before Amicia finally steps in, but their consternation fades as soon as the words come out of her mouth. 

"Well, then," Cassandra says, stepping forward, and if she were the type of person to touch somebody without the intent of decapitating them, Amicia can tell she'd be pulling her into a tight hug as she speaks. "Let's get to work, shall we?"


End file.
